Broadband Switch-Mode Radio Frequency Power Amplifiers using Tunable Components

在移动基站的功率、带宽、效率和散热方面，最关键的部分是PA。新的通信标准的出现，如具有高回退功率水平的WCDMA和LTE，进一步加剧了这些问题。PA的峰值和回退效率差会影响所需冷却系统的大小和变送器的预期寿命。另一方面，较差的带宽可能导致对多应用程序覆盖的多个PA需求。因此，高效的宽带线性放大器对于实现小型、可靠和低成本的发射机至关重要。到目前为止，这些要求无法通过传统方法同时实现，例如线性a类，ab类，j类和谐波调谐pa。在该方案中，使用可控匹配网络的PA的可重构性是研究的重点。此扩展的目的是改善项目第一阶段的成果，在带宽，输出功率和线性度方面。在这种情况下，将研究通过输出匹配网络和栅极电压优化，在各种退退功率水平下设计高性能宽带开关模式PAs。此外，高性能非线性器件（如变容管）和开关（如引脚二极管），适用于高频和高输出将被研究。最后，对基于这些非线性分量的优化匹配网络进行实现。

The most critical part of the mobile base stations, in terms of power, bandwidth, efficiency and cooling, is the PA. The advent of the new communication standards, such as WCDMA and LTE with high back-off power levels, has further aggravated these issues. The poor peak and back-off efficiencies of the PA can affect the size of the required cooling system and life expectancy of the transmitter. On the other hand, the poor bandwidth can result in multiple PA requirements for multi-application coverage. Therefore, highly efficient wideband linear PAs are essential to achieve small, reliable, and low cost transmitters. Until now, these requirements could not be achieved simultaneously by conventional methods, such as linear class-A, class-AB, class-J and harmonically tuned PAs.In the proposal, the re-configurability of the PA, using controllable matching networks is the focus point of the investigation. The aim of this extension is to improve the achieved results of the first phase of the project, in terms of bandwidth, output power and linearity. In this case, the design of high performance broadband switch-mode PAs at various backoff power levels, through output matching network and gate voltage optimizations, will be studied. Further, high performance nonlinear devices (e.g. varactors) and switches (e.g. pin diodes), applicable for high frequencies and high Pout will be investigated. Finally, the realization of the optimized matching networks based on these nonlinear components will be performed.